August 2015 Discussion: Dhalgren (spoilers)
 

The time has come to discuss the August 2015 MobileRead Book Club selection, Dhalgren by Samuel R Delany. What did you think?

I couldn't get past the first two chapters. Abandoned and hated. Life is too short to spend it reading books that don't appeal. What really annoys is that we had several other, far better, books in the original lineup that would have been a pleasure to read (or re-read). Ah, well, it just goes to show that not all books work for all readers.

I agree. This was utter shite. The Martian would have made a much better discussion then how bad Dahgren is. I have to give you brownie points for even getting to the end of chapter two. I gave up in the middle of chapter one because it's just too long to bother with.

I started it, then got an review copy to read, and has yet to return. I also felt it lack "urgency" in the first two chapters

I got the first two chapters under my belt but I've had difficulty convincing myself to go on. They had the consistency of a dream journal; in fact, I strongly suspect the entire book is one man's extended and padded dream journal. I may yet finish it; the writing has a poetic style that presents a certain appeal, but I find the surreal quality of the story tends to wear thin.

I liked it as a teenager, but I couldn't have said exactly what it was about.
Anyway, currently I'm only about halfway through. There'a a lot of stuff I didn't remember. I hope to finish it this weekend.

The Millions article about the book.
http://www.themillions.com/2010/06/d...-r-delany.html

Interviews and video at SF Signal.
http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/201...-grand-master/

His short story, Aye, and Gomorrah, can be read at The Internet Wayback Machine (You may have to Select All the text or copy and paste to read it):
http://web.archive.org/web/200804301.../delany31.html

Delaney must have been on some seriously strong illegal drugs when he wrote Dhalgren. It makes no sense. Maybe if we too were "stoned/high/out of our minds" we might understand it.

Well, heck, if everyone's going to read just the first two chapters, I can do that too. I did check it out of the library. It was the 800 pages in its entirety that made me pass. :D

Now I'm curious.

I have to admit, now I'm becoming more curious, also. But the first chapter doesn't strike me as much of a drug trip as it does of a dream. Ulysses is the drug trip. At least the 10% I read was.

I was so engrossed in Dhalgren that in my effort to stay awake I almost missed my stop this morning. But I am reaching towards end of the second chapter. Hopefully the third chapter will have something more about where this is going.

Read the first chapter. Not my cuppa tea. I think I'll move on to something better.

Yep.




.

I'm truly aghast at the reaction to this my favorite book of all time. Sigh.

All the smoke from the western wildfires is blowing in across the mountains making Denver feel much like Bellona today....

I think Dhalgren's your favorite book largely because of the poetic imagery, Kenny. Am I right?

I'd have a better time of this book as an audiobook, I believe, but I can't find one.

But here's a hardcover edition for $500.00 if anyone's interested.

I still have my 1974 paperback. I'll let you have it for $200.

Have you checked out the moon yet?

That's part of it....but certainly not all. I really identify with the protagonist. I think it is a more realistic story of our life experience than most. I love the self referential aspects of the book, the themes, and the greater meaning.

Its hiding behind the haze. :D

I can't go that low but how about $250?

I totally agree. it is one of those books where audio book would have been much better choice. I am also on lookout for audio version. I don't want to give up yet.

Yes, that's it. prose that's artistic with no real plot and no meaning at all.

I finally finished re-reading this today. I decided to forget about trying to decipher what it all meant until I finished and just read the book, taking whatever happens as it comes. I did enjoy it for the most part. As for the meaning I'm sure the conversations Kid has with Madame Brown and with Calkins near the end are important. I'll have to think about it.

The best description may be what a friend said about "The Prisoner" TV series (which he adored). Like Patrick McGoohan, Delany "knew he wanted to say something, was sure he had something to say, but was never quite sure how to say it or sometimes exactly what it was."

Oh, and I liked the fact that it's a circular novel: it ends with a sentence fragment that is completed by the first words of the book.

Thanks Ben.

I finished and thought it was one of the most unique books I've ever read... some sort of flawed masterpiece or brilliant mess.

The thing about discussing it is that there are so so many different things that could be touched on with almost equal importance and so it's a bit daunting. I suppose I'll write about some of the things I liked and leave it at that. It was easier to follow and a faster read than I was expecting. Some parts, including the beginning, are indeed difficult but once I got the swing of the novel the story sections flowed well. I thought it might be boring and while I did find it overlong I generally was interested to see what would happen next. In fact, at the end I was sad to leave the characters.

I liked the 1960's/70's counter-culture focus. This book could have easily felt dated but I didn't find it so; instead I found it immersive and complex, and fascinating to delve so deeply into this time period and compare things to today as well. I also found many of the characters to be layered and complex and I was surprised to find myself feeling a warmth for most of them after awhile. One specific thing is that I liked that the novel presented such a wide spectrum of not only sexuality but personality within sexualities - that's incredible coming from a bestseller from over 40 years ago, let alone one today.

The setting of Bellona was intriguing - the idea of a singular post-apocalyptic city mostly abandoned and just left to itself while the rest of the world forgets about it, and that the few people now living there more or less want to be. A city something like if Hurricane Katrina had not only partially destroyed New Orleans, but had also stuck around as an eerie, ever-present and atmopshere-encompassing storm cloud ready to finish the job at any moment. Bellona is a Sodom or Gomorrah, a limbo or netherworld, that may seem terrible to most but holds its own allure and peculiar rewards to those who want to venture in.

I liked the meditation on the nature of art; it deals specifically with poetry but it could be transferred to any art. Along similar literary lines, the book was very Joycean and not only because of its sometimes difficult writing style - it also concerns youthful artistic endeavour like Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, it structures itself on Greek mythology like Ulysses and it starts and ends on the same broken sentence like Finegans Wake.

The schizophrenia of the book was, in retrospect, well done. This is really why the book can seem so hard since it was necessary for some parts to be almost indecipherable and other parts confused - days missing, reality blurred, time altered.

Excellent! Woo-Hoo! Someone 'got' it! :D

I got it. It's a drug infused mess.